Newspaper Page Text
W>e Lamp *
By ARTHUR STRINGER A W. N. U. Service # “L-
Carol Coburn, Alaska-born daughter of a
“bush rat" who died with an unestablished
mining claim, returns North to teach Indian
school. Aboard ship, she is annoyed by
Eric (the Red) Erlcson and Is rescued by
Sidney Lander, young mining engineer. Lan-
It was not, I could see, a very
appealing abode. It looked, with its
sagging and snow-mattressed roof
and its time-weathered timbers,
about as inviting as a mausoleum.
Nor did it add to my joy when I
saw Sock-Eye, kicking away the
snow, disclose the flattened-out body
of a dead coyote lying there, its
teeth grinning malevolently up from
the uncovered jawbones.
My companion, with a prompt
sweep of his foot, brushed the frozen
carcass to one side and swung open
the door. Doors in Alaska, I re
membered, were very seldom
locked.
I had to shut my teeth tight so
the trembling of my chin wouldn't
betray me. For about all that musty
smelling and deep-shadowed room
held was an untidy wall bunk, a
table and two wooden chairs with
roughly spliced legs. I could see
where the smoke pipe had fallen from
a rust-stained stove and where ro
dents had been attacking a grub box
Imperfectly armored with a Joseph’s
coat of flattened-out tobacco tins.
Above it was a dish shelf with a
few rusty pans and a showing of
sadly chipped crockery. At the foot
of the bunk lay the dead body of a
parka-squirrel, half buried in a scat
tering of lint from a much-chewed
quilt. Along the wall directly above
the bunk were tacked, to remind me
Alaska was still a man’s country, ir
regular rows of equally irregular
movie-queens, interspersed with
dancing houris. Each and every one
of them, I observed, was in an ar
resting state of dishabille.
But even more revolting was the
filth that covered the floor.
Sock-Eye’s questioning glance
must have detected some shadow of
hopelessness on my face.
“You a-goin’ t’ stick it?” he chal
lenged.
“I’ve got to,” I said. “There’s
no other way.”
My companion, as he turned and
swept that room with a saturnine
eye, proclaimed that an old skinflint
like Sam Bryson should have two
inches of lead in his gizzard. “But
since he’s put you here, I’m a-goin’
t’ give you a hand t’ git planted.”
I had thought of Sock-Eye as a
maundering old man. But as he
threw off his coat and got busy 1
realized I had altogether misjudged
both his skill and his strength.
His first act was to force open the
windows.
Then, grunting with indignation,
he went at the place like a cyclone.
He tumbled the greasy table and
Chairs out into the snow and scraped
the litter from the floor. Then he
left me alone with my worn-down
stub of a broom. He reappeared
with a rusted axhead, into which he
fitted a rough handle of birch wood.
When he started to shovel the ashes
from the stove-box I told him to
save them, as they’d come in handy
for scrubbing.
By the time he had a fire going
and snowwater melting in our galva
nized tub I’d unearthed a shriveled
cake of yellow soap and a lopsided
scrub brush. While I scoured the
grease-blackcncd table and chairs
with hot water and wood ashes ho
dragged the bunk mattress out into
the snow, emptied it, pounded the
last of the dust from it, and refilled
it with wild hay which he comman
deered from a pole-stack at the
back of the clearing.
At last everything smelled clean,
and seemed different, and the sing
ing of the old iron kettle on the
drum stove was almost homelike.
But my spirits declined to rise as
they should.
Sock-Eye, after spitting into the
rusty stove front, reached for ( his
coat and crossed to the door.
“I’m a-goin' over t’ the village,”
lie offhandedly announced. “We've a
une-hoss store there. I’ll see if I
kin rustle a pair o’ blankets and
pack in a mite o’ grub for you.”
When he returned, 1 stood blinking
at the size of his sleigh load.
“Git in out o’ the cold,” he com
manded. “I reckon 1 purty well
know what a cheechako needs.”
1 felt my throat tighten.
"You can’t do this for me,” I
contended as Sock-Eye piled things
on the table end.
“1 ain’t a-doin’ it for you,” he
retorted. “I’m a-doin’ it for your
oT pappy. He rustled many a mess
o’ grub for me.”
That didn’t take the lump from
my throat. I watched him in silence
as he disinterred two candles from
his store supplies and lighted them.
“Evenin’ ’pears to be cornin’ on,”,
he said. “1 reckon I may as well
stay an’ have chow with you.”
I started to thank him, but he
cut me short.
“When you git settled,” he said.
“You’ll have t’ have a gas lamp.
And I’U tote over a hunk of sour
dough for your bread-makin’. And,
meanwhile, I’ll leave you a slab o’
deer meat that’ll help tide over the
week end.”
I laid the table, using a newspaper
for a cloth, while the old-timer be
side the stove cooked bacon and
eggs and put coffee on to boil and
punched two holes in the top of a
milk tin with his hunting knife. He
was surprisingly adroit and quick
THE STORY SO FAR
dcr. working for the Trumbull company,
which is fighting Coburn's claim, is en
gaged to Trumbull's daughter.
Lander breaks with Trumbull and moves
to Sock-Eye Schlupp's shack.
Carol gets the school Job at Matanuska
INSTALLMENT I*ll
handed about it all. When he sharp
ened a stick and on it speared a
slice of bread, which he began
toasting at the stove front, I found
the aroma of that browning bread
mixing with the aroma that came
from the coffeepot. And I realized
there were times when food was
more important than philosophy.
“Things is goin’ t’ come easier,”
explained Sock-Eye as we ate to
gether with the honest and una
bashed appetite of the hungry, “once
you've took root here.”
“And made friends with my neigh
bors,” I added.
“You ain’t got no neighbors with
in a mile,” countered Sock-Eye.
“And the valley folks nacher’ly ain’t
goin’ t’ fall over themselves t’ wel
come you, seein’ you was sent in
here by them Juneau bureaucrats.
Yep; you’ll have t’ stoke that of
firebox yourself. And rustle your
own grub and wood and water. I
s’pose you’ve got a shootin’ iron?”
I didn’t see, I told him, how a
shooting iron could solve any of my
problems.
“It kin ease your mind consider
’ble,” argued Sock-Eye. “There’s no
satisfaction like knowin’ you’ve got
a six-gun in reach. Kind o’ perks
“It kin case your mind
consider’ble.”
you up when you’re alone. And I
reckon I got an of blunderbuss or
two I kin be bringin’ over t’ you.”
I was afraid to thank him for
what he had done. It didn’t seem
to be the valley way. I merely
stood in the doorway watching him
as he trudged off in the snow and
was lost in the blue-tinted darkness.
CHAPTER VIII
Those first days in my Matanuska
wickyup always remained a clouded
memory of discomfort shot through
with incongruous moods of exalta
tion. But Sock-Eye had been right.
One took root, in some way, and
fiber by fiber time wove one back
to the soil of one’s birth.
I learned more about the valley
of the Muddied Waters—for that, in
the language of the local Indians,
was what the word “Matanuska”
meant. It revealed itself as a deep
soiled and lightly timbered valley
of almost two hundred square miles,
with a friendly huddle of mountain
shoulders that cut off the Arctic
winds and framed the lowlands in
eternal white. Diagonally across
the valley ran the Matanuska River,
and up that river, in the open season,
the salmon came in swarms. Here
and there, along the lower benches,
little patches of land had been
cleared, mostly as subsistence farms
for hill trappers and disheartened
gold-seekers, like old Sock-Eye and
Sam Bryson. On those farms they
grew two-pound potatoes and thirty
pound cabbages and oats and rye
and hay as high as a horse’s back.
B’or the growth from that black soil,
once played on by its bath of twenty
hour sunshine, was prodigious.
But the little homestead shacks, I
found, were scattered and far apart,
and life, apparently, was still pre
carious, with no fixed marked for
the settlers’ produce and no final
reward for a short season of indus
try after a long season of hiberna
tion.
Yet the valley was rich. It could,
according to Sidney Lander, prove
itself the grub bag of the North.
Its soil was drouthless and inex
haustible. And under that soil it had
coal in abundance. And through all
its outer hills it had game enough
for an ever-enduring backlog on the
fires of hunger.
I came to Matanuska as a teach
er, but it was the valley, I found,
that was teaching me things. Its
first lesson seemed to be that fron
tier life was the mother of inven
tion and the father of resourceful
ness. For I learned how to attach a
wire handle to a discarded gasoline
can and turn it into a water pail,
and how to cover an empty packing
HOUSTON HOME JOURNAL, PERRY, GEORGIA
through Doctor Ruddock's aid. But there's
no sehoolhouse for her. For a residence
she gets an abandoned shack. But Carol
Is optimistic about Matanuska.
The shack truly needed some thorough
overhauling and Sock-Eye helped.
case with chintz and convert it into
a dressing table. I learned how to
stulT duck feathers into a sugar bag
—with the lettering boiled off in lye
water—and call it a pillow, and how
to make sheets out of factory cot
ton and dish towels out of flour
sacks, and even a Dutch oven out
of two boxes interlined with chopped
oat straw. I relearned how to whit
tle shavings from a spruce stick and
start a fire, and chop wood without
standing in a tub to protect my feet,
to say nothing of the discovery that
birch logs split easiest when frozen.
I knew how a baking-powder tin
could be turned into a biscuit-cutter,
how bag burlap with a design cro
cheted on its ends made a passable
door mat, how a broom handle fast
ened across a room corner curtained
off with calico converted the same
into a clothes closet, and how life,
after all, was mostly what you made
of it.
I’d never liked that red-rusted old
stove of mine, standing as it did a
monument of neglect at the center
of my new family circle. So on a
sufficiently mild afternoon when I
could afford to let the fire go down
I decided to sandpaper off some of
the rust and replace it with a bright
and shining coat of black lead.
The old potato sack I’d pinned
around my waist didn’t leave me
looking any too regal. My hair came
down and my hands took on a dis
tinctly negroid tint. On my face,
too, I must have smudged a good
deal of the black lead that should
have gone elsewhere. And just as
1 was wielding my polishing brush
on the last rough-surfaced old stove
leg a visitor walked into my hum
ble abode and stood regarding me
with a quietly bewildered eye.
“Where will I find Carol Coburn?”
an unexpectedly well - modulated
voice inquired of me.
I knew who it was, even before
she told me.
“I’m Carol Coburn,” I told her,
as quietly as I could. “Won’t you
sit down?”
She blinked at me, for an incredu
lous moment or two.
“I’m Barbara Trumbull,” she an
nounced.
“I know,” I murmured as I poured
water into my tin basin and engaged
in a hasty struggle to remove some
of the black lead. “Can’t I make
you a cup of tea?”
“No thank you,” she said, with a
second study of my partially
cleansed face. She pulled up her
sleeve and looked at a jeweled wrist
watch. “I’m flying bafck to Anchor
age in a few minutes.”
“I’m sorry,” I said in the silence
that ensued.
“You know Sidney Lander,” she
observed. She said it softly. But it
was like the softness of velvet with
a razor blade wrapped up in its
folds.
“And?” I prompted, feeling that
all the frostiness wasn’t to be on one
side.
“And you know, of course, that
we’re to be married next summer?”
she continued, making it half a ques
tion and half a challenge.
“Yes, he told me about that,” I
acknowledged.
And again I heard the musical
laugh edged with ice.
“You and Sidney, I understand,
had a very adventurous trip togetiv
era few weeks ago.”
“We got storm bound on the trail,”
I explained. “But he survived it,
quite unscathed.”
“That’s what I wanted to make
sure of,” said the lady in the mink
coat, ignoring the touch of acid in
my voice. But her eyes narrowed
a little. Then, with great delibera
tion, she drew off the luxurious
gauntlet that covered her left hand.
It was a very white hand. And on
the third slender finger I could see
the glitter of a diamond.
“That’s his ring,” she quietly
but conclusively announced. “Do you
want to stop my marriage?”
It impressed me as rather primi
tive. But I was at least compelled
to respect the lady’s directness.
“What makes you think I could?”
I asked.
She, apparently, both suspected
and resented my air of guileless
ness.
“My convictions in that quarter
seem to be weakening,” she said
with a languid sort of asperity.
“Then why bother about the source
of them?” I countered, a little tired
of being accepted as merely an Aud
rey of the backwoods.
“Wiry are you fighting my fa
ther?" John Trumbull’s daughter
rather abruptly demanded. “And
making Sidney break with the one
man who could have him amount tc
something? It won’t, of course, dc
any good.”
I met her gaze without flinching.
“Are you saying that for your owr
sake,” I asked, “or for your fa
ther’s?”
Barbara Trumbull laughed a lit
tle.
“My father’s big enough to fight
for himself,” she announced.
“Then what are you worrying
about?” I found the courage to in
quire.
(TO BE COMIM'ED)
. . . JUST LIKE MOTHER USED TO MAKE!
(See Recipes Below)
IT WAS WONDERFUL FOOD!
Remember flying home, pigtails
thumping, to smell supper, and
guess? Remember being saucer
eyed as mother’s marble cake took
a blue ribbon at the fair? And re
member licking the last bit of sweet
ness from the frosting platter?
I know you must remember. How
could you forget? It was wonderful
food!
And it’s to the best cooks in the
world our mothers that this
week’s column is dedicated. When
you pay them homage on Mother’s
day, 1941, perhaps you’ll enjoy us
ing some of the following recipes,
favorites of the long ago.
In those days, to be caught with
out plenty of food, and good food,
| rrStfs t 0 for all com '
ers was to show
IWIIIW oneself a poor
'lilt housekeeper, a
jMiW'j bad hand in the
kitchen.
TT/ J' \\\ But mes have
l\ v changed. A large
7®* “crock” of but
fV ' ter, a “basket”
of eggs, and a “wedge” of cheese
are no longer a part of the regular
supplies on the shelf in the vegeta
ble cellar. Nor are recipes penciled
on the fly-leaf of the family ledger.
But the basic goodness is still the
same.
So, whether it be crusty brown
doughnuts, chicken pie and jelly
roll, huge, fluffy cakes, or rich
chocolate pie, let’s take mother
back, down memory lane!
Lovely to look at and utterly de
lightful to eat is the Sour Cream
Devil’s Food Cake, which I’m sure
was a favorite of grandmother’s.
Sour Cream Devil’s Food Cake.
2 cups sifted cake flour
1 teaspoon soda
M> teaspoon salt
% cup butter or other shortening
IVi cups sugar
1 egg, unbeaten
3 squares unsweetened chocolate,
melted
1 teaspoon vanilla
Vz cup thick sour cream
% cup sweet milk
Sift flour once, measure, add soda
and salt, and sift together three
times. Cream butter thoroughly,
add sugar gradually, and cream to
gether well. Add egg and beat very
thoroughly; then chocolate and va
nilla, and blend. Add about one
fourth of the flour and beat well;
then add sour cream and beat thor
oughly. Add remaining flour, alter
nately with milk, a small amount at
a time, beating after each addition
until smooth. Turn into two greased
9-inch layer pans and bake in a
moderate oven (350 degrees F.) 30
minutes, or until done.
Spread Felicity Frosting on top
and sides of cake. Top with glossy
LYNN SAYS:
In an old book of household ad
vice, written in 1879, are some
words of wisdom “to help home
makers.” I’m passing them on to
you “for what they’re worth” in
the modern, up-to-date home.
“Use a clam shell to scrape
skillets or saucepans; to scour
your iron pots and griddles, use
wood ashes.
“Sweeping a carpet with new
fallen snow will make it look
very bright and fresh. Also, it
is a good plan to save tea leaves,
and, with them not too moist,
sweep a dark carpet. This is
not advised for light colors.
“Woodwork may be dusted with
a long-feathered wing, preferably
that of a turkey.
“For washing fine clothes, use
a pounder—not a large, old-fash
ioned affair, but one about twice
as large as a potato masher, and
pound your clothes as they soak
in sal-soda water. The rubbing
on a board will then be very
easy. Use a clothes wringer if you
can possibly get one.
“Never buy ground coffee.
Take whole berries and heat;
grind while hot.
“All housewives should be well
adversed in cookery, and should
know how to make good dishes,
such as ‘Jenny Lind Cake,' ‘Pars
nip Pie,’ ‘Marrow Dumplings’
and ‘Flannel Pancakes.’ ”
THIS WEEK’S MENU
Menu For a Mother-Daughter
Banquet
(For not-too-large a group)
Strawberry and Pineapple Cup
Roast Chicken Giblet Gravy
Bread Filling Fresh Asparagus
Fruit Salad
Ice Cream Cookies
Coffee Milk
chocolate coating, made by com
bining 1 square unsweetened choc&-
late, melted, Va cup sugar, and Va
cup water. Cook over low flame
until smooth and thick. Cool slight
ly. Double the recipe for three 10-
inch layers.
Felicity Frosting.
2 egg whites, unbeaten
2 cups brown sugar, firmly packed
Dash of salt
7 tablespoons water
Combine egg whites, sugar, salt
and water in top of double boiler,
beating with rotary egg beater un
til thoroughly mixed. Place over
rapidly boiling water, beat constant
ly with rotary egg beater, and cook
7 minutes, or until frosting will
stand in peaks. Remove from fire,
but allow to remain over hot wa
ter, and beat 2 minutes longer.
Place over cold water and continue
beating 3 minutes. Makes enough
frosting to cover top and sides of
two 9-inch layers.
♦ * •
Just like mother used to make.
1 That’s what you’ll
V /'// say w^en y° u
'/ taste the delicious
, i J cookies, made by
the directions giv
en below. When
mother baked
cookies she made
them rich with
butter and usual
ly full of fruit, like:
Fig Oaties.
Boil 5 minutes in water to cover;
IV2 cups dried figs
Drain, clip stems and cut figs into
thin strips (scissors are handy).
Cream together:
1 cup butter
2 cups beet or cane sugar
Add:
3 eggs, beaten
Blend well, then add liquids:
Va cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
Sift together and add:
IV2 cups sifted all-purpose flour
% teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
Add:
Figs
5 cups quick-cooking oats
Stir until well blended, then drop
by small spoonfuls onto greased
cooky sheet and flatten slightly.
Bake in moderately hot oven, 400
degrees F., for 13 to 15 minutes.
Press a nut meat, strips of fig or
cherry into tops before baking if
desired. For a glazed top, brush
with hot honey after baking and
place under broiler for a minute or
two. Makes 5% dozen medium-sized
cookies,
• • •
Do you recall the old cracker bar
rel? It was a necessity in days gone
by when homemakers often made
their -own crackers, and even their
own baking powder and bread start
er. Thinking that perhaps in your
spare moments you might like to
try your hand at cracker making.
I’m including a recipe.
Crackers Made With Yeast.
V 2. package granular yeast
1 pint warm water
quarts flour
1 tablespoon salt
Va cup sour milk
Vs cup shortening
1 teaspoon soda
Set sponge of yeast, water and
flour at night. In the morning add
the other ingredi
ents and flour to fjf!
stiffen very stiff.
Pound with roll-
ing pin. Fold over L }
and pound again,
Continue until the
dough is smooth.
Place on a lightly floured board and
roll in a thin sheet. Cut in squares
and punch holes on top with a fork.
Place in ungreased pans and bake
in a 400-degree F. oven. These are
inexpensive and very good!
(Released by Western Newspaper Unlon.J
•» 5 5 V* r Y‘
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ahrvscTlTfta
f? « 4»/| <0 £- 4 g M
Cruel Experience
Housewife—Have you been of
fered work?
Tramp—Only once, mum. Apart
from that I’ve had nothing bur
kindness.
A reader asks if debt-collecting
Is a profession. We would call it a
pursuit.
Horse Power
Marian—Mabel says she’s wildly
in love with her new car.
Martin—Just another case when
man is displaced by machinery.
SIMPLE ENOUGH
“I don’t understand dem ter
mometers.”
“Well, you see, when it gets
durn cold the mercury sorter hud
dles down in der bottom of do
tube so’s to keep warm.’’
On the Line
Engaged girl, referring to her sweet
heart’s family—They claim to be con
nected with some of the best families, i
Rival — Yes—by telephone.
A Stumper
When the two business men met,
one said to the other: “I have
made an addition to my staff. I
have engaged a man at $5,000 a
year to do all the worrying for
me.”
“But how are you going to get
the $5,000 to pay him?’’
“Ah, that will be his first
worry 1”
Depression is defined as a period
of time in which we have to do
without what our parents never
had.
Bright Hopes
Private Smith was brought be
fore his commanding officer and
charged with being disorderly in
the canteen the previous night.
“Now, Smith,” said the C. 0.,
“this is the tenth time you have
appeared before me on this charge.
What have you to say?”
“Well, sir,” said Smith, “I hope
our acquaintance will ripen into
friendship.”
EDUCATIONAL
ART TRAINING you can use. Combine
study and vacation. $15.00 per week covers
room, board and tuition. Former Univer
sity teachers. Box 74, Mt. Airy, Georgia.
Laws Gravitate
Laws and institutions are con
stantly tending to gravitate. Like
clocks, they must be occasionally
cleansed, and wound up, and set
to true time. Henry Ward
Beecher.
f J 0 *TfIKE THE SPRING OUT OF
Wipf SPRING COLDS- USE2DROPS Of
M PEMETRO saa
Sin of Omission
A wrong-doer is often a man
that has left something undone,
not always he that has done some
thing.—Marcus Aurelius.
• Today’s popularity
of Doan's Pills, after
many years of world
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And favorable public
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These physicians, too, approve every_ word
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If more people were aware of how the
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derstanding of why the whole body suffers
when kidneys lag, and diuretic medica
tion would be more often employed.
Burning, scanty or too frequent urina
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WNU—7 19—41
BARG Ami
jj —that will save you many a >
;[ dollar will escape you i| *
<; you fail to read carefully and /
<; regularly the advertising ot
<; local merchants » " * /
|IW THIS PftPßgl
